Last night, in a routine effort to better align American to industry standards with other global carriers, American begin collecting carrier-imposed surcharges on tickets for travel on other carrier’s metal. This change was intended for revenue tickets only, but the surcharge was erroneously added to AAdvantage award redemptions on other airlines as well. Except in the cases of British Airways and Iberia (where American currently collects these surcharges), no carrier-imposed surcharges will be applied when redeeming AAdvantage miles for award travel on other carriers. Any customers who encountered this fee in error will be fully refunded.

This morning I posted that American was beginning to collect fuel surcharges on award tickets on more of their airline partners.

I priced out awards on Malaysia Airlines and those included fuel surcharges, where they had not previously.

I had an agent read me a memo saying that as a new policy they were collecting these fees on partner airlines though there might be some exceptions.

And American’s social media team seemed to confirm the change.

However, I did try to hedge a little bit (“If this proves true..”). I reached out to some folks at AAdvantage who didn’t know anything about a change, which seemed odd

And now we have the word — there was an error, there were changes intended for pricing of revenue tickets, and there will not be a major fuel surcharge rollout on award tickets.

Related

What does “American begin collecting carrier-imposed surcharges on tickets for travel on other carrier’s metal” mean? Even for revenue tickets, was American not charging some fees previously?

Burz said,

Mistake or brilliant ploy to liquidate outstanding miles?

Linda T said,

I was awake when Lucky first posted this and have been up ever since trying to figure out what if anything to book. I was partly convinced the sky wasn’t actually falling yet and that is why I decided to wait and see so this confirmation is welcome relief. Also, my husband was proofreading his 1300 page book and so there was no way he was going to discuss an as not yet planned trip!

Rob said,

Now the whole blogosphere can be back to shill those Citi AA credit cards.

Daves said,

I very much welcome this news. I had jumped to put an award on hold on dates I didn’t really prefer. Now I can calmly reconsider if I want that redemption or not. I hope that those who paid right away in anticipation of a horrible emasculation of the program will have the chance to cancel without penalty if they wish.

PedroNY said,

So once the merger is complete, isn’t this something we should expect anyway?

So what was the actual that AA made? They must have ALREADY been collecting the YQ on partner revenue tickets. Is it just an issue of changing how they allocated the fare they collected, without changing the total fare?

LarryInNYC said,

“actual” = “actual change”

jay said,

Gary – do you buy this explanation? they hadn’t been collecting YQ on revenue tickets prior to last night? isn’t that an outright lie?

Dax said,

I’m still waiting for any of the bloggers who broke this story to explain how on earth a “glitch” wrote its own memo.

Joel said,

@Dax +1

Nick said,

This isn’t something we should expect or stomach at any point. I will fly the airline that doesn’t charge YQ, and have nothing to do with those that do. I predict they will raise their award chart to compensate. It’s a case of buyer beware with AA at the moment.

Itchy Cat said,

@Gary I still can’t get it. So did the agent you talked to just make up the memo??? It clearly states that “imposing fuel surcharges for award tickets on all carriers”. I sense there is something more than a system error behind this.

@Itchy Cat indeed it seems weird to say ‘the memo was really just talking about revenue tickets’ since it isn’t obvious to me what partners American wasn’t previously charging YQ on for revenue tickets when those carriers impose those charges themselves. Odd indeed. And yet the folks at AAdvantage I reached out to first thing in the a.m. seemed to genuinely not know anything about a change to award tickets, so I don’t think it’s just a coverup either.

@Dax – the CLAIM is that the memo applied to revenue tickets and not award tickets, and I have asked more than one person at American what new charges apply to revenue tickets that did not apply before last night? I will update with any answer I receive.

Jon said,

Gary the answer to the last question in #16 is important and I hope you write a short blog post on the answer, as a bad answer could mean that surcharges are coming at some point.

Dax said,

@Gary – Thanks. I think that after yet another sudden reversal AA needs to be on the record with a more plausible explanation and a promise that surcharge awards are not in the works for the future and that YQ awards from other carriers will NOT be matched by AA. That may be a lot to ask but after a series of stunts followed by confusing explanations it’s time for AA to go on the record with more than just another “whoops, our bad” reply.

Vic said,

Dax +1

Ryan E said,

On the one hand I don’t buy that it was a “mistake” and I do think this is something they will do at some point. Yet, would they really backtrack in a matter of just a few hours, due to some blog, twitter and FT complaints? And if so, were they that tone deaf to not have anticipated the reaction and been prepared to push through it anyway?

It could be a trial balloon just to see how bad the complaining would be – however I would’ve waited a bit longer if so, to gauge reaction beyond the hard core enthusiast community that notices these things right away.

Add A Comment

View from the Wing is a project of Miles and Points Consulting, LLC. This site is for entertainment purpose only. The owner of this site is not an investment advisor, financial planner, nor legal or tax professional and articles here are of an opinion and general nature and should not be relied upon for individual circumstances.

Advertiser Disclosure: Many (but not all) of the credit card offers on the site are from banks from which we receive compensation if you are approved. Compensation does not impact the placement of cards other than in banner advertising (we do not currently control the banner advertising on this blog). We don’t include all US credit card offers available on this site. Instead, I write primarily about cards which earn airline miles, hotel points, and some cash back (or have points that can be converted into the same).

Editorial Note: The opinions, analyses, and evaluations here are mine and not provided by any bank including (but not limited to) American Express, Chase, Citibank, US Bank, Barclaycard or any other company. They have not reviewed, approved or endorsed what I have to say.